Tuesday, June 14, 2011

REDCap - data capture for research studies

The REDCap Consortium is comprised of 232 active institutional partners from CTSA, GCRC, RCMI and other institutions, and it supports a secure web application (REDCap) designed exclusively to support data capture for research studies.

REDCap (Research Electronic Data Capture) is a secure web application for building and managing online surveys and databases. Using REDCap's stream-lined process for rapidly developing projects, you may create and design projects using 1) the online method from your web browser using the Online Designer; and/or 2) the offline method by constructing a 'data dictionary' template file in Microsoft Excel, which can be later uploaded into REDCap. Both surveys and databases (or a mixture of the two) can be built using these methods. REDCap provides audit trails for tracking data manipulation and user activity, as well as automated export procedures for seamless data downloads to Excel, PDF, and common statistical packages (SPSS, SAS, Stata, R). Also included are a built-in project calendar, a scheduling module, ad hoc reporting tools, and advanced features, such as branching logic, file uploading, and calculated fields. REDCap has a quick and easy software installation process, so that you can get REDCap running and fully functional in a matter of minutes.